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Model behaviour

Jo Casamento

She's part of Hollywood's reality royal family, the Kardashians, who are better known for sex tapes, Louboutins, fast cars, zillion-dollar houses and two-minute marriages. But Kendall Jenner is showing vastly different interests to her fashion-obsessed siblings and a maturity beyond her years during her fleeting visit to Sydney.

Rather than spending her 17th birthday on Saturday dancing on tabletops in a Las Vegas nightclub, S can reveal the up-and-coming model was to receive a traditional birthday welcome in the remote outback of north-west Australia from indigenous elder custodians alongside esteemed photographer Russell James, where she has undertaken a three-day trip to learn about indigenous communities in remote areas.

James, whose book Nomad Two Worlds was launched on Thursday night at The Star, says while he is convinced Kendall - who also did a shoot for Miss Vogue while in town - will be a supermodel; there is something more to her. And thankfully, the Keeping Up with the Kardashians brand (and cameras) are about as far removed as possible from her trip here.

School days ... Jesinta Campbell. Photo: Supplied

Even her notoriously controlling and dollar-hungry mum, Kris, is here for the ride - just supporting her daughter's vision and acknowledging she is on a different path to the rest of the fame-obsessed family.

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''Kendall has an unusual challenge and that is she has a PR brand - and being a model requires a different strategy,'' James told S.

''However, from the moment I laid eyes on her I saw enormous potential [as a] supermodel - the same as the first time I shot Gisele [Bundchen]. This girl's gonna be huge, and it's a feeling I've had only seven or eight times in my career.''

Speaking out against bullies ... Campbell now. Photo: Fotogroup

But the veteran photographer says Kendall expressed an authentic interest in his journey to reconciliation and his Nomad initiative, which has been heralded by Bill Clinton and Al Gore, among others, globally.

''She's amazing from a modelling perspective, but her authenticity struck me directly …,'' he says. ''She said these magical words to me, 'I'd love to find out how to make difference.'''

James doubted her commitment until her first red-carpet interview on Thursday night.

Ridgy didge ... HRussell James and Hugh Jackman. Photo: Tamara Dean

''I was nervous as hell until yesterday and she said, 'I'm here to learn, to get educated,' and I thought, 'This is a great fit, OK this is real, this isn't self-serving when she could have been.' She's incredible.''

Jackman on ice

In the make-up trailer having his hair styled into Wolverine points, Hugh Jackman winces as he puts his foot in a bucket of ice. ''That's what happens when you do action movies when you're too old,'' he told S's Shelly Horton. ''Icing body parts becomes part of your life.''

How he has time to ice anything is beyond comprehension. Jackman is so busy with his brutal filming schedule, launching the Actors Centre Australia, supporting local live theatre, helping promote Russell James's book Nomad Two Worlds, being super-dad to Oscar and Ava, adoring husband to Deborra-lee Furness and getting up at 2am for protein shakes.

Doesn't he sometimes just want to pull a doona over his head and hide? ''Who doesn't?'' he said. ''If anything, the thing I want the most is more time being a parent. If I did a straight nine-to-five job, I'd probably feel the same. But I am busy and I've always had that problem - I can't say no. I don't want to miss out.''

The couple also have to think of rebuilding, with their New York apartment ''completely destroyed'' by Hurricane Sandy, Furness told S at the launch of Nomad Two Worlds on Thursday night. Jackman is patron of the charity of the same name, but had to miss out due to a last-minute scheduling change.

''I'm devastated,'' he said. ''It's a project I'm passionate about. Nomads is about reconciliation and bringing cultures together in a social business sense.'' A percentage of the book's proceeds will be funnelled to art projects in indigenous communities. ''I like the idea of a hand up, not a hand-out.''

Jackman says his kids love being immersed in indigenous culture. Oscar has learnt to play the didgeridoo: ''He performed on stage with the didge players as part of my Broadway show. He played didge about 15 times out of 100 shows. The first time, I knew how scared he was and he looked at me and he said, 'Dad, I don't think I can do it,' and I said, 'You don't have to do it.' But he did, and someone in the front row of the New York audience leapt up and gave him a packet of Tim Tams. And I saw his face register, 'So I do this and I get paid in chocolate? This is awesome!' Which let's face it - I'd do it for Tim Tams, too. Just don't tell my agent.''

Sweet revenge

While popular model Jesinta Campbell, 21, was voted Miss Congeniality and won friends during her time in the Miss Universe contest, her experience at school was the complete opposite: merciless bullying forced her to move schools. Campbell is among a group of women, including DJ Ruby Rose and The Voice's Sarah Lloyde, who have penned letters to their high school tormentors for Marie Claire magazine.

''I felt so demeaned and annihilated every day by your snipes and toxic whisperings. It made me wish I could disappear,'' she writes in the magazine, out on Wednesday.

''It took me years to overcome the legacy of your bullying … I was terrified every time I walked out of class. I felt sick with fear when you got that boy to push me into the pole and looked on laughing and telling me I better really watch out now. I started having panic attacks in the morning. I couldn't take it any more, so my parents moved me to another school. Don't think that means you won - that move led me to find wonderful new friends. Your bullying gave me a thick skin that now helps me in my career. With each life success I am shaking off the memories of your abuse. But you will never be free from knowing how despicably you behaved.''

Rose also bears the scars from six years of intense bullying at school, which culminated in a horrific, premeditated incident in which girls beat her with metal chairs in a cafe, repeatedly smashing the back of her skull, and saw her hospitalised with severe head trauma. She says she still suffers muscular issues that require regular injections as a result.

''You attacked me at the lockers - pushing, slapping, kicking and punching me and pulling my hair. From there, your violence towards me was unrelenting. I felt so vulnerable and afraid as you terrorised me with death threats, verbal abuse, spat on me, threw eggs and flour or Coke all over me, and sent notes around the school saying, 'Ruby is going to get her head bashed in today.' I was too afraid to fight back in case you'd beat me up. Getting through each day was a survival quest - my own private Hunger Games-style hell,'' Rose writes.

''I knew they had knives and had put another girl in hospital, so I was petrified … It was like living in Lord of the Flies … While I will never forgive you, I don't waste my energy hating you, because that would be like drinking poison every day. Instead, I enjoy the sweetness of my success. Doing well feels like the ultimate revenge … instead of letting you destroy me, I resolved to live a great life.''

Former Bad Boy makes good

Nicholas Hope will forever be remembered as the title character from Rolf de Heer's Bad Boy Bubby. The role involved violence, incest and a cat being smothered in plastic, and left a lasting impression.

But the AFI winner, pictured, just announced as head of acting at Sydney's the International Screen Academy, says he was left ill-equipped by old-fashioned teaching techniques early in his career.

The ISA aims to help students in changing times, including how to write a proposal for government funding and high-end visual effects. ''It's specific to screen acting - all aspects of film and TV - as well as internet media, gaming, animation and voice-over work in these incredible facilities,'' Hope says.

With auditions to start in the last two weeks of the month, the state-of-the-art school - funded by a mystery millionaire - opens in February. ''My theatre training served me very well for quite a while in theatre but Bubby was a steep learning curve in terms of acting for camera, but it was at least shot in sequence,'' Hope says. ''The next major film I did, Lust and Revenge, I felt utterly unprepared for, as it was shot in a standard format, which is out of sequence … It was a mediocre performance and, to me, [co-star] Claudia Karvan, who had had quite a lot of experience in film and TV, well, the difference between us was massive.''

Tough story for the Kennerleys

Of the millions of interviews she has done, Kerri-Anne Kennerley admits her personal story with her brother, Malcolm, was the toughest. While Kennerley, who has put on a remarkably brave face during her own public battle with breast cancer (no doubt she'll be the first to greet you in a Melbourne Cup marquee), has had the most gruelling year of her life, things were worse behind the scenes.

KAK's older brother underwent radical brain surgery, the story of which appears tonight on Seven's Sunday Night. Speaking exclusively to S, Kennerley revealed she had to hold back tears during taping of the story, which tells how Malcolm - a gentle giant - was struck down with the incurable disease, essential tremor.

The tradie, who struggles to hold a glass or use a knife and fork and is trapped in a body he can't control, had a six-hour operation on camera to switch on a pacemaker device connected to his brain. KAK has still not been able to watch the raw footage of the operation.

''We were in Queensland at Princess Alexandra Hospital the day before the operation, and where they chose to set up happened to be the oncology ward and I saw a sign on the door and started to shake,'' she says. ''I had to steady myself and take some really deep breaths; it was really confronting being in hospital again and it really spooked me. I really couldn't focus at all.''

KAK says her brother's life is dominated by the disease, which is getting worse. ''It affects his entire life; he can't cut up food, he can't swipe an eftpos card.''

She says she has seen only ''a politely edited'' version of the vision shot from the operation.

MORSELS

Sydney was chock-a-block full of holidaying celebs this week. Val Kilmer had some cuddly koala time at the Wild Life Sydney Zoo and Sea Life Sydney Aquarium at Darling Harbour with his daughter, Mercedes. And Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis invited a group of local celebs - including Mel B, and Brian McFadden and his new bride, Vogue Williams - to dinner on Thursday night at Three Blue Ducks Cafe in Bronte. Apparently his peeps called their peeps (that's how it works in superstar land), although S hears Nat Bass, Ronan and Guy declined - all being too busy with their tots. Also jetting in with Halloween-masked spirit was tattooed singer Ke$ha, and popsters Sophie Monk and Delta Goodrem also enjoyed the sunny city. Melbourne, brace yourself for this week. Kim Cattrall, Carmen Electra and Mena Suvari are among the celebs flying in.

Speaking of Sophie Monk, S heard she was in the running for a judging spot on Nine's newest recruit from Seven, Australia's Got Talent. But calls to the network were met with: ''We're still at the drawing board stage.'' Producers are looking at ''big international names'' and will definitely be introducing changes to make it ''funnier and fresher'', S was told. Industry talk suggests the show will be brought in line with the British format, with much tighter scheduling allowing for night-after-night viewing for a shorter period and potentially four judges.

Mel B and her hubby, Stephen Belafonte, dominated gossip headlines all week with her court appearances, trick-or-treating with kids and scuffles on floating bar The Island - where the couple were involved in an altercation with girls on a hens' night. The spat started when Belafonte took issue with two women he believed were taking photos of him and his wife. They were in fact taking personal photos for themselves, with no idea who Belafonte was. S hears a woman had her camera SIM card taken and her phone reformatted. Also on The Island on Saturday night were Holly Brisley and footballer Steve Menzies' wife, Suyin. Brisley told S: ''It was my first night out after having baby Willow three months ago. I was doing my own thing.''

After dozens of knock-backs here, Aussie model Daniel Garofali has found better luck in New York, where he was immediately signed to Wilhelmina Models. He's now being called the world's first social media male supermodel, via some clever marketing and bombarding. ''I always make sure to take the time to converse with them [fans] individually through my social networks. I am honoured and grateful. We created these products because they have been asking for some time,'' he says of his calendar and DVD - all available through his online store. Definitely brains behind the brawn.